COSMIC EMOTION. 



83 



We want, therefore, to know something more 

 definite about the kind of action which makes 

 an organism more organic. 



This we can find, and of a nature suitable 

 for cosmic emotion, by paying attention to the 

 difference between molar and molecular move- 

 ment. We know that the particles, even of 

 bodies which appear to be at rest, are really in a 

 state of very rapid agitation, called molecular 

 motion, and that heat and nerve-discharge are 

 cases of such motion. But molar motion is the 

 movement in one piece of masses large enough 

 to be seen. 



Now, the peculiarity of living matter is, that 

 it is capable of combining together molecular 

 motions, which are invisible, into molar motions, 

 which can be seen. It, therefore, appears to 

 have the property of moving spontaneously, 

 without help from anything else. So it can for 

 a little while ; but it is then obliged to take 

 molecular motion from the surrounding things 

 if it is to go on moving. So that there is no 

 real spontaneity in the case. But still its changes 

 of shape, due to aggregation of molecular mo- 

 tion, may fairly be called action from within, be- 

 cause the energy of the motion is supplied by 

 the substance itself, and not by any external 

 thing. If we suppose the same thing to be true 

 for a complex organism that is true for a small 

 speck of living matter — that those changes in it 

 which are directly initiated by the living part of 

 the organism are the ones which distinguish it 

 from inorganic things, and tend to make it more 

 organic — then we shall have here the nearer 

 definition of organic action. It is probable that 

 the definition, as I have stated it, is rather too 

 precise — that the nature of the action, in fact, 

 varies with circumstances in the complex organ- 

 ism, but it is always nearly as stated. 



Let us consider what this means from the in- 

 ternal point of view. When I act from within, 

 or in an organic manner, what seems to me to 

 happen ? I must appear to be perfectly free, for, 

 if I did not, I must be made to act by something 

 outside of me. " We think ourselves free," says 

 Spinoza, " being conscious of our actions, and 

 not of the causes which determine them." But 

 we have seen reason to believe that, although 

 there is no physical spontaneity, yet the energy 

 for such an action is taken out of myself — i. e., 

 out of the living matter in my body. Ab, there- 

 fore, the immediate origin of my action is in my- 

 self, I really am free in the only useful sense of 

 the word. " Freedom is such a property of the 

 will," says Kant, "as enables living agents to 



originate events independently of foreign deter- 

 mining causes." 



The character of an organic action, then, is 

 freedom — that is to say, action from within. The 

 action which has its immediate antecedents with- 

 in the organism has a tendency, in so far as it 

 alters the organism, to make it more organic, or 

 to raise it in the scale. The action which is de- 

 termined by foreign causes is one in regard to 

 which the organism acts as if inorganic, and, in 

 so far as the action tends to alter it, it tends also 

 to lower it in the scale. 



It is important to remember that only a part 

 of the body of a complex organism is actually 

 living matter. This living matter carries about 

 a quantity of formed or dead stuff; as Epictetus 

 says, tyvxapiov el ^acrra^ov venpov — " a little soul 

 for a little bears up this corpse which is man." ' 

 Only actions originating in the living part of the 

 organism are to be regarded as actions from 

 within ; the dead part is, for our purposes, a por- 

 tion of the external world. And so, from the 

 internal point of view, there are rudiments and 

 survivals in the mind which are to be excluded 

 from that me, whose free action tends to prog- 

 ress ; that baneful strife which lurketh inborn 

 in us is the foe of freedom — this let not a man 

 stir up, but avoid and flee. 



The way in which freedom, or action from 

 within, has effected the evolution of organisms, 

 is clearly brought out by the theory of natural 

 selection. For the improvement of a breed de- 

 pends upon the selection of sports— that is to 

 say, of modifications due to the overflowing 

 energy of the organism, which happen to be use- 

 ful to it in its special circumstances. Modifica- 

 tions may take place by direct pressure of ex- 

 ternal circumstances ; the whole organism, or 

 any organ, may lose in size or strength from 

 failure of the proper food, but such modifications 

 are in the downward, not in the upward, direc- 

 tion. Indirectly external circumstances may, of 

 course, produce upward changes ; thus the drying 

 up of axolotl ponds caused the survival of indi- 

 viduals which had " sported " in the direction of 

 lungs. But the immediate cause of change in the 

 direction of higher organization is always the in- 

 ternal and quasi-spontaneous action of the or- 

 ganism. 



1 Swinburne, " Poems and Ballads." I am aware of 

 the difficulties which beset Dr. Beale's theory of germinal 

 matter, as they are stated by Mr. G. H. Lewes ; but, how- 

 ever hard it may be to decide what is living matter, and 

 what is formed stuff, the distinction appears to me to be 

 a real one, to the extent, at least, of the use here made 

 of it. 



